I Bet You'll Float
by buttahbug
Summary: In-Progress. I too was inspired after seeing It and I also have fallen in love with Bill Skarsgård. I loved reading others interpretation on the movie, so I thought I'd do my own! I'll touch up the summary when I've gone a little further with my story. Hope you enjoy :)
1. Chapter 1

The air was cool as it ripped through my thin polyester jacket. The walk home was brisk; the streetlights flickered against the dark coloured sky. It was nine o'clock on a school Tuesday night. I had just finished studying at the library, second year of college meant late nights doing homework that was left to the last minute. The walk home wasn't long, twenty minutes at most depending on the pace. Mine was slow tonight, the fresh air cleared my head so I took my time. The town of Derry was quiet tonight, sound only coming from headphones and the click of my heels on the sidewalk. The concrete ahead of me was attached to a dirt path that strayed into a long set of trees with a dark canopy cover. My parent's voices echoed in my mind reminding me about dark paths late at night. I lit a cigarette in protest to their imaginary scolding. I veered left toward the dirt path, it was a nice night out and I was in no hurry to get home.

I took an inhale of smoke and stared straight ahead as I walked. Unafraid of the dark but still on alert. I lowered the volume on my phone, just in the case. The path in front of me started to descend; it wasn't the same direction as I'd remembered. Maybe walking in the daytime made it seem different, I was relying mostly on the feel from my feet on the path. I ashed out the cherry on my smoke and put the butt in my pocket. I came to a stop when a small trickling stream appeared in front of me and removed my headphones from my ears. Spring peepers and crickets echoed in the dark, meshing in with the sound of rushing water. Checking behind my shoulder, the exit of the forest had disappeared almost completely. My heart started to pound in my chest. Although just finishing my last smoke, I lit another one. "I came in one way, I can get out the other," Satisfied with my self-reassurance, my moment of panic began to ease.

"You got another one of those?" I heard a voice say from my left. My head snapped up, but nothing could be made out from the darkness. My hand instinctively went to my pocket and I pulled out the extra cigarette, still searching the dark for the voice. I took an inhale of my own and then an exhale. I shifted my body and adjusted my purse, thinking to myself that maybe I just imagined it.

"No, you didn't imagine it...you didn't imagine me," A clown emerged from the darkness. Orange tufts of hair puffed out from the side of his head, his face was white with red paint lines down his face. His lips were a deep red, which was spread out into a smile. Startled, I took a step back and my heart rate increased again. A smile crept across his face as he took a few steps towards me. "What brings you out here? You're some ways away from home," he purred. I tried to swallow the lump in my throat, searching for words while stunned from what I was witnessing. I offered the cigarette the stranger asked for with an outreached hand. He grinned. "Well, how very brave of you." He almost sounded sarcastic. "Everybody needs a smoke once in a while; you look like you could use one." It didn't even sound like me saying that. I was shocked at the words coming out of my mouth. The clown started to laugh hysterically. He bent his body forward as his high-pitched laughs echoed out in the dark. I took a few more steps back when I felt he wasn't looking. "How very kind of you," He grinned. I could've sworn I saw his eyes glazed over orange, instead of the blue I noticed earlier. The ends of my finger tips started to tingle.

"I should be getting home now." I stated, still my hand was reached out towards him, holding the smoke out as far as I could. I didn't want him to come any closer to me than he had to. I imagined me flicking it at him, turning and running away as fast as I could. How fast could I run up that hill? What happens if he tried to catch me? Would I be fast enough? I knew I needed to exit this situation quickly.

My stomach dropped when he took one more step towards me. "Of course, it's getting late." His eyes squinted at me while the smile remained on his lips. A long arm extended towards me; with a white gloved hand, he took the smoke. I took a half step back. "Have a good one," I walked backwards away from him, just as I was about to turn forward, he spoke once more. "You got a light?" He grinned, showing his pointy teeth. A cold chill ran down my back and fear started to fill my body. His eyebrows raised slightly, his smile widened. As if he noticed my raised concern.

My eyes stared at him, unblinking, as I reached a shaky hand into my jacket for the light. He hung the cigarette out from his lips. "Lighters don't float." My skin fell cold. "What?" My voice cracked and I started to shake. I could've sworn his teeth became sharper. There was something so unsettling about that sentence. The same cackled laughter erupted from the clown. It echoed in my head, along with a strange ringing in my ears. I had to leave. Right now. Cold sweat formed on my forehead as I started to panic. The laughter continued. I threw the lighter at his feet and made a run for the path's exit. I didn't know if he was following me. I didn't know how much further I had to run. I stumbled up the slight incline. The laughter seemed to disappear behind me. The path veered a left, then a right, and another left. " _This isn't right. The path was straight_. _Why is the path veering!"_ I screamed at myself, though my feet didn't slow down for even an instant. I just ran, and ran and ran.

My sprint came to a sudden stop. In front of me was a sewer tunnel with dark murky water slowly trickling from it. I stumbled around, my head was all over the place and my heart was beating so hard I could hear it in my ears. I looked all around me in every direction. Looking for the clown. Looking for the exit. I couldn't breathe and I felt as though I was going to pass out. The smell of cigarettes invaded my senses. I slowly turned to look over my shoulder as a puff of smoke blew into my face. The clown had appeared behind me. He pulled the rest of his cigarette in one breath, flicked his butt at me and blew the smoke out slowly. "I bet you'd float. I bet I could make you float." He lunged towards me, and everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

I changed my point of view for Chapter 2, and I think I will keep it this way. I found it a lot easier to write this chapter than the first. First person POV may return, maybe if things become a little more intimate ;). For now, I'll keep Pennywise more classic. Also, thanks to my new followers! This is my first story I have ever written on here and I'm very excited on where this story may end up And I will introduce my main character soon! I'm working up to it

Chapter 2.

Pennywise paced swiftly in his dark, wet, underground lair. Occasionally glancing at the unconscious girl laying on concrete. He would wait patiently until she woke, until then he felt peckish. His hunger had not been properly quenched in quite sometime. The epidemic of fear was at an all time low, children were just not so easily scared anymore. He growled. The projection in his mind displayed the memory he had observing the impersonators that would prowl around the streets at midnight, portraying clowns as a joke. Cowards and lowlifes with pitiful humor. Making a mockery of his work, this fear that he had been building up for centuries now. All gone to shit by one summer fad. He could bring the fear back. He would. He just needed a pawn to get the games started once again. His existence counted on it.

She stirred against the pavement. The ringing in her head traveled down her whole body, it reached both her arms and stopped at her left shoulder. White-hot pain blinded her mind momentarily and she let out a whimper. The dryness of her throat halted her from crying out any louder. Instead, the sound of hot air surpassed her lips, and her eyes opened for the first time in twenty-four hours. The joint in her shoulder was detached from the socket from the rough handling she had received earlier. Flashback, her knees buckled and her mind blanked when the clown took those final steps towards her. Hoisting her over his shoulder, all the way up his tall seven-foot body, violently throwing her to the ground when he arrived to his home with a pull of her arm. He remembered feeling it dislocate, he laughed when she hit the floor. Choking back muffled giggles as he left her in the dark.

The air was misty with gleaming lights that shot down from the surface above, highlighting the bottom of the sewer. Specks of dust drifted slowly across the pane of light. It was almost peaceful. She propped herself up with her right shoulder, and took in her surroundings. She was dazed, confused, and over-whelmed. Everything fused together into mush in her brain. She felt as though she could be sick, unknown to what brought her here, where she was, or what her fate would become. Her head snapped behind her, at the sudden awareness that someone was present in the same area in which she found herself trapped. The clown emerged from the dark shadows from the side on the sewer, taking slow strides towards the female on the ground. Tears formed from her eyes but she did not cry out. She did not move or make a sound. As every step the stranger took towards her, she felt more certain. She was about to die. The promise of that thought would have tamed her raging sanity if her adrenaline had not kicked in. Within an arms length reach away, the clown stranger came to a halt. His knees bent smoothly as he lowered his body to reach eye level with the little girl he brought down here. Little was a joke for him, as many of the other humans he had come into contact with were smaller than him. He figured this particular human could not have been more than twenty-three.

"Beautiful scent," The clown leaned his nose in towards her. "Fear." It almost came out as a purr. "I have not smelt this in quite some time. It was almost irresistible in the forest." A hand reached out and brushed her blonde hair that was matted with sweat against her face with the backside of his hand. She trembled in response to the touch. "Wh-what are you going to do with me." Her lips were dry and cracked. She felt them tear as she spoke. Pennywise grinned, eyeing the spot of blood that drew to the surface on her lower plump lip. "I might need to find myself a new candidate. This is almost too much." His massive hand reached towards her throat, with his fingers almost overlapping, he grabbed onto her pulsing neck. As one would grab onto a cool beer can. She began to choke and gag, half out of fear, half out of the lack of breath. He rose to his feet, his grip still firm on her. She tried to fight him off with her one arm, letting her dislocated shoulder dangle and sway with her movement. She cringed at the reminder that it was still unattached to her body. Her fingers barley grazing his face, the clown began laughing and mocking her weak attempts.

"I'll he-help y-you. I'll do what y-you wa-want." Her pleads echoed in the sewers, down the drainpipes that eventually reached the outside world, but reached no receiving end. "Please don't hurt me." Her tears trailed down her face and at this point, the flow of oxygen almost completely stopped. The clown pulled her face closer to his, his long tongue caught the falling drops of warm salt water off the side of her cheek and he grinned. "You will do just fine for me, and you will float afterwards for the rest of your days. When I am done with you, you will die. If you escape me, you will die. Only then when you are decaying in the weeds of the earth, will you be free from my order." His normal, rounded teeth suddenly became a sharp point. His lip pooling out warm drool onto the floors of the sewers. His eyes, once yellow, glazed back over into a lovely sky blue.


End file.
